Disparate education and child abuse

Issues of unequal education opportunities, forced child labor, and child abuse are closely related—they are the reactions to a breakdown of economic opportunities, political systems that do not provide adequate safety net social services, and a disempowered public sentiment to help the situation (among many things).  The one unifying damage is an erosion of the strength of family, disabling the family from protecting and raising children.

True, it is important to break apart prostitution rings, stop factories from employing children, but we also have to target these issues at its very roots by limiting the number of vulnerable children.   We do this through prevention—from the grassroots level through uplifting families, supporting villages and communities to look out for their own.

These children have no one to take care of them, making them a child of the world, and ultimately our children. The One Heart Source Center will ensure children’s basic rights are protected by first identifying all orphaned and vulnerable children one village at a time. This will ensure that every one of these kids will be enrolled and attending school while being a part of a family that fosters positive growth.

EDUCATION

  • Around the world, approximately 120 million primary school-aged children are out of school, and the vast majority are girls. (UNICEF) 
  • If all children received a complete primary education, an estimated 700,000 new cases of HIV can be prevented each year - seven million in a decade. (Global Campaign for Education)

LABOR

  • 73 million working children are less than 10 years old. (International Labor Organization)
  • The largest number of working children age 14 and under is found in the Asia-Pacific region, with 127 million children engaged in child labor. However, sub-Saharan Africa has the highest proportion, where nearly a third of children under age 14 - 48 million - are involved in child labor. (International Labor Organization)

ABUSE

  • An estimated 40 million children under the age of 15 suffer from abuse and neglect, and require health and social care. (World Health Organization)
  • Millions more children are being trafficked, forced into debt bondage or other forms of slavery, and forced into prostitution and/or pornography.
    • 0.3 million in armed conflict
    • 1.2 million being trafficked
    • 1.8 million forced into prostitution/pornography (International Labor Organization)

Child prostitution has become a common reality in Sub-Saharan Africa. This is due to an incredibly large population of orphans in an environment that offers little to no social wellbeing for abandoned children. The lack of resource and manpower to limit prostitution leaves this population of children in a state of complete vulnerability. With no one to watch out for them, they easily fall prey to exploitation in order to receive the most basic needs of food and shelter.  In Tanzania 36,000 girls (ranging from age 9 to 17) were recently discovered to be in a child trafficking and prostitution system.  In many cases single parent mothers have to choose which of their daughters they give up to prostitution in order for the other children to be able to eat.